This Sunday's sermon text was John 15: 1-8, which reads...
“I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. 2 He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful. 3 You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. 4 Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.
5 “I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. 6 If you do not remain in me, you are like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned. 7 If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. 8 This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.
Click through to hear some of the things we talked about regarding this amazing gospel!
The key verses for our consideration on Sunday were 4 and 5. "Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me. I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing." The comparison here is easily understood and absolute. Through Jesus we find life, growth, and faith. Apart from him we wither.
This would appear to be a godsend for those who argue that faith is a black and white issue. It is! Either you have it or you don't. There's no "sort of" life. There's no halfway journey. You're either attached to the vine or you're not.
You'll get no argument from me about this. It's been true in my faith relationship with God and I've seen echoes in my relationships with people dear to me as well. If I try to stick my relationship with my kids in neutral, for instance--keeping them on a back burner for a few days so I can accomplish things I deem of higher priority--that doesn't have a neutral effect on our relationship but a detrimental one. I don't come back after three days of saying, "No, Daddy can't play with you" to the same relationship I left. I come back to kids who are hurt and lonely. I've not stayed even but gone backwards. There's no real middle ground. You're either living or you're dying.
The problem I have is the loose criteria people employ when trying to determine who's living and dying in the faith. Folks are happy to embrace the simple black-and-white of Jesus' metaphor here but they get incredibly sloppy when it comes to the rest of the description. Some folks fall back on church doctrine or personal heritage when trying to determine who's attached to the vine. "We're the right church and they're the wrong one" or "We've been part of this church for 600 years and they just joined" come easily from the lips. Others want to point to lifestyle. "Those folks are surely condemned. Thank goodness we're not like them!" Notice a commonality developing here? Somehow when we describe it we're always part of the true vine while others are withered branches. Every war that's ever been fought in history has seen folks behind either front claiming, "God is on our side!"
Most distressing of all is the modern tendency to equate faith with one's own feelings or opinions. We flip-flop constantly, deciding what we believe and what we don't, judging people or churches or God himself by whether they stand in agreement with us. It's like the Living Vine is just a big decision tree with God resting at the exact juncture of Yes and No answers that we have adopted. If anyone deviates they must not be part of the TRUE vine, with "TRUE" meaning "just what we think" and false being anything or anyone who disagrees.
I've heard people (myself included) called "ungodly" and "ignorant of scripture" for ending up with a different opinion than others. I've heard churches claim their doctrine as sacrosanct and favored by God where that of other churches is suspect and damnable. I've seen people rest secure in the knowledge that they are of the right nationality, background, social class, or lifestyle to curry God's instant favor...worthy of praise while others merited only forgiveness at best.
This leaves me incredulous because Jesus didn't mention ANY of this stuff when he explained how we are attached to him. The one and only criterion he gave was, "No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me," followed by, "This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples." He neither solicited nor offered opinions on the best lifestyle, background, church choice, political leaning, or any other matter. He said, in essence, "You'll know people who are attached to the vine because they bear fruit."
And what is this fruit? It appears right after this in the gospel which we'll be reading next week, John 15: 9-17. It also showed up in our second reading this Sunday, 1 John 4: 7-21. The fruit of which Jesus speaks is...love. That's it. Love.
Remember all of the criteria that people want to slap on top of this lesson to prove that they're better and more favored and more right and thus part of the True Vine while others are not? Well, guess what that process is the opposite of? Yup. Love. Ironically (and predictably) the things we want to rely on to show that we're part of God are exactly the things which, when employed in this way, prove that we're not.
The implications for our faith life and individuals and a church are clear here. It's not enough to just exist. There's no claim to history or doctrine or moral right or political stance which will avail us or keep us glued to the vine. We're there because God chooses, in love, to support us. In turn we are to choose, in love, to support the world with the same mercy, forgiveness, and life-giving spirit which God has shown to us. If we're not bearing the fruit of love to the world we're not doing anything worthy.
That kind of radical claim is like an earthquake hitting our established pattern of church thinking. Our churches can't be entities unto themselves, out for their own good, protectors of the heritage, shelters for the privileged, trying to suck everyone inwards to bloat the ranks of "believers" (read: "converting people to think like we do"). Churches have to turn inside-out, pouring themselves out for the world, bearing fruit every day as every person of faith encounters his or her world.
This is a monumental task, requiring a serious shift in the way we see and do "church". But this gospel also contains a monumental warning about what happens when we don't. There is no neutral, remember? Churches, too, are either living or dying.
Which will our church be?
--Pastor Dave (pastordave@geneseelutheranparish.org)
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